| Abstract: | Toxic episodes of diarrhetic shellfish toxins (DSP) in shellfish harvesting areas have serious economic and public health implications, where fluorescent protein phosphatase inhibition assay (FPPIA) may be a highly useful tool for monitoring purposes. This paper presents results from the first inter-laboratory study to validate the assay. Three laboratories participated in the design and development of the inter-laboratory work. Standard solutions and spiked samples of the main toxin, okadaic acid, were used at the beginning of the validation exercise to avoid cross-inhibition of other toxins that would otherwise deteriorate the quantitative significance of the data. HPLC with fluorimetric detection of okadaic acid was also submitted to inter-laboratory validation to be subsequently used as a quantitative reference method. FPPIA results from spiked samples were free of systematic bias in any laboratory and determinations repeated over 3 days showed that the classic “repeatability” was the main within-laboratory source of variability (15-26% R.S.D. depending on the sample).After the inter-laboratory validation of both HPLC and FPPIA methods, 83 samples of mussel hepatopancreas collected during a toxic DSP episode were analyzed over 9 weeks. Toxic levels determined with FPPIA were in line with mouse bioassay results, highlighting the lack of false negative results of the FPPIA test: 98.7% of samples whose concentration of okadaic acid equivalents was over 0.8 μg/g hep., provided positive bioassay results within 24 h of observation time. The reliability and the quantitativeness of the FPPIA method in naturally contaminated samples was demonstrated by intercomparison with mouse bioassay and HPLC. |
